OFFICIALLY AN OUTCAST
IT WAS the 17th of June, 1929. I was host at a luncheon party at my home in Peking -- a luncheon given for Frederick Moore who was again in China, but not as a representative of the New York Times. Amongst the other guests at this stag affair were the American Minister, MacMurray, and Major John Magruder, then U. S. Military Attaché of the American Legation, now General Magruder, stationed in Chungking.
To my annoyance I was summoned from the table just as the fish was being served. My Number One Boy said there was a telephone call, and that it was urgent. It was the local representative of Reuter's, the British news agency.
"What comment have you to make on Nanking's demand for your deportation?" was the question which greeted me.
I had heard of no such demand, and said so. Reuter's man then read me his news dispatch from Nanking, saying that Dr. C. T. Wang, then Minister for Foreign Affairs, had sent a note to the American Minister demanding my deportation on charges that my news dispatches had consistently been biased, unfair, malicious, and untrue, and so framed as to jeopardize the continuance of friendly relations and good understanding between the government of China and that of the United States.
When I returned to the dining room and broke the news to my guests, all of them, except MacMurray, were startled. The American Minister had had no foreknowledge of the demand made that day, but both he and I knew that the then
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